Red Sox, Yankees Talk Squirrel Delay, ‘It Made A Little Noise At Me’
There were as many squirrel delays as there were runs scored during the Boston Red Sox’s 1-0 win against the New York Yankees on Friday night.
In a scoreless game in the top of the fourth inning, a squirrel took the field at Yankee Stadium, darted across the diamond and headed for Red Sox rookie Jhostynxon “The Password” Garcia in the batter’s box. From there, the animal scurried toward Yankees starting pitcher Max Fried, approached New York first baseman Ben Rice and eventually sprinted down the foul line.
“I said, ‘Really, that’s going to happen to me in my MLB debut, that’s unbelievable,'” Garcia said through the team’s translator, according to a report by Conor Roche of the Boston Globe.
“My first reaction was, ‘Don’t do anything that might embarrass you.’ I thought it was just going to run around, but it came straight to me and went in the little hole I created on the mound,” Fried added.
Rice may have had the most entertaining on-field and postgame reaction, as he juked out of the way when the squirrel headed toward him.
“I didn’t want to touch that thing,” Rice said, per Roche’s report. “The guys are giving me crap for it. ‘Why are you scared of a squirrel?’ I don’t know where that thing’s been. It made a little noise at me.”
Red Sox manager Alex Cora made a prediction following the contest.
“Somebody’s going to make a shirt out of it and make a lot of money tomorrow,” Cora said.